I was in no mood for his banter. “What do you want, Lei?”
He peered down at me through the bars, his eyes narrowing. “I heard you’ve been refusing food.”
I looked away. “I’m not hungry.”
It was a lie. I was hungry all the time. Hungry for lixia, for the intoxicating surge of spirit power in my veins. I needed it, craved it, ached for it all the time. I could feel the nearness of my jade, its energy thrumming just out of reach. The lack left me breathless and off-balance, as if I were missing a vital sense.
“Funny,” said Lei, his expression unreadable. “You used to strike me as a survivor.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I snapped, losing my temper. How dare he judge me from his seat of privilege? “Go gloat somewhere else, will you?”
He crouched in front of me, so that we were eye level through the bars. “From one prisoner to the next—” He tilted his head, his amber eyes seeming to absorb the flickering firelight. “If you lose your will to live, it’s simple. You die.”
With that, he rose to his feet. “Do you want to die? If you die, they win. Remember that.”
I started eating again. Thefood upset my stomach, forced me to use my broken hands, and heightened my lixia cravings, but at least I started to feel strong enough to stand again. To take a few steps around my cell. To think beyond the span of a day. Two days, a week—that was the limit of what I could take.
The warden’s questions kept coming, though they were no longer accompanied by torture. Vaguely, I wondered what Sky had done to achieve such a feat—what he might have bargained with. For there was always a price. I hadn’t known that the first time.
“Though you were initially accused of black magic practitioning,” said Warden Hu, watching me, “it seems now your accusers have retracted their allegations. Any guesses as to why?”
I shook my head.
“Let’s say you did know a thing or two about black magic,” he said. “How might one access such a power?”
I told him nothing more than what was common knowledge.
“But why can only some access such a power?”
I said I didn’t understand.
“Why are some stricken with seizure and lunacy when confronted with spirit power, while others retain clarity of mind?”
For the first time in a while, I recalled that strange, rippling haze outside the inn in New Quan. The bandits who had wandered near were drawn by the lure of spirit power, moving toward the portal as if in a trance.
“It is a tear in the veil,” the dragon had told me. “So that any human, not just those with seals, can enter our realm. But only those with strong enough spirit affinity can survive such a place. The rest…”
The rest lost their minds.
“Are more gates appearing?” I asked, raising my head.
“Gates?”
“Portals into the spirit realm,” I clarified.
“What are they caused by?” asked the warden, more urgently now. “Why are they forming?”
“I-I don’t know,” I said, taken aback. “But I wonder if it has something to do with overuse of lixia,” I added quietly, thinking of a similar rippling haze I’d once found in my mother’s chambers, which were now sealed and boarded up.
If there were more gates appearing, that meant there were more spirit summoners at work. But who? Chancellor Sima was dead. I was locked away in an iron dungeon. Could there be someone else? Someone who’d been biding their time?
Lately, I’d begun to feel a prickling to my senses, though I’d chalked it up to lixia withdrawal. An uncanny sense, as if the spirit realm were somehow nearing. As if the worlds had begun to merge.
Before I could respond, the passageway door burst open. Sky raced toward us, his face alight with undisguised joy. “Father’s agreed!” he exclaimed, skidding to a stop in front of my cell. “Meilin can go free.”
I blinked at him, unable to process his words.
“Did you hear me?” he asked. “You can come out with me, now. Your maids are waiting for you—they’ll help you wash and prepare for court. I asked Mother to set aside a few dresses for now, but once we get your measurements I’ll send for…” He trailed off as he took in my expression. “Meilin…why are you shaking?”
